How to Help Students not Running Out of Time

Students feel as though schools try to contain them and that they are not able to be themselves. They are forced to sit in a chair for a certain amount of time and to quietly complete assignments. The thought of this recurring activity results in students caring less about school, which eventually makes their grades decrease. By shortening the school days, students wouldn’t be as distressed about going to school and their grades would be higher. Fewer school hours per day would permit students to have enough time to study, complete school assignments, participate in after-school activities and be able to get to bed by a decent hour.” Rachel D, Teen Talk student writer.

What is your least favorite class, the one you dread most? Picture yourself walking into that class, taking a seat, and watching the clock move slowly as you suffer through the next 90 minutes. Yes, you read that correctly. Imagine being stuck in your least favorite class for an hour and a half! This is a reality that many high school students experience every day. It is block scheduling. “Unlike traditional bell schedules - which typically comprise six to eight class periods per day, lasting anywhere from 45 to 60 minutes - block schedules contain just four daily class periods, with each one lasting an average of 90 minutes” (Block Scheduling in Schools 1). Although designed to increase student achievement, block schedules carry a number of disadvantages that make them an inadequate method for offering high school students a successful learning environment. Despite its few benefits, block scheduling works in direct conflict with most human attention spans, creates more scheduling problems than it solves, and lacks any solid evidence of improving student learning. In a world where educational practices come and go, block scheduling is a fad that should never have arrived in the first place.

After a long day of school, students are tired, stressed, and overworked. This is often something that is ignored when it comes to students of all ages. Homework provides a heavy load that can add additional stress and time on a student’s shoulders. Schools should be making sure that students are receiving enough work throughout the day, to make sure kids do not have the worry of homework when school is over. Students who receive lots of homework, may not have enough time in the evenings to be around family, friends and enjoy the rest of their day.

Another part of the problem with high schools is the amount of homework is given to students. Let’s say that a student has five classes a day and receives five hours of homework each night. That leaves the student little to no time to spend time with family and friends, go to work, play a sport, and even

Many students do not have enough time due to the countless hours doing excessive school work. Students have assignments that can and

Castle View High School, although some teachers,students,and parents say that homework is something that every student should do and should be a necessity, there should actually be less homework for students so their brains don’t get hot wired. The first reason is that students tend to improve if they spend at least 2-3 hours of doing homework. Students don’t want to spend 2-3 hours of homework after a long day of school, that can be exhausting to them and their brains. Doing homework very little, improves elementary and middle schoolers, homework mostly only helps improve high school students. Another reason is, teachers like students to continue working on the lessons that were taught, to be continued at home. We’ve decided ahead of time

The quality of students’ homework is much more important than the quantity of students homework and data collected during recent studies has proven that homework is not making the grade. “. . . American students are entangled in the middle of international academic rankings: 17th in reading, 23rd in science, and 31st in math according to the most recent results from the Program for International Student Assessment (PISA)” (Murphy-Paul). Students should not be given an excessive amount of homework because the pressure of having to complete excessive amounts of homework every night is quite daunting for most students. Knowing how much homework is the right amount correlates with age and grade. An 8th grade student should not be given a myriad of homework that would keep her awake past midnight completing assignments. In any case, there should be a limit on the amount of homework all teachers give to students because an excessive amount of homework would eventually cause students to become uninterested in school and learning, which could result in poor test scores and low ranks in international academic rankings. In order for students to carry out daily activities throughout the day restfully, teachers must be able to provide homework that does not exceed the appropriate amount of time needed to complete it, which is based on grade level. If teachers are too clueless of a students health due to excessive amounts of homework, many students will develop cases of sleep

Schools are increasing time available for instruction by extending classes beyond the traditional fifty minutes. The reason for this is because when students are in up to eight classes that are fifty minutes the content can become fragmented. There is less time for students to reflect on the eight subjects they are being taught and can only produce moderate work. Some high schools provide students with dual enrolled courses with a partnering university. If a student decides to use this opportunity, students are able to graduate high school with college credit because of the extended time formats in block scheduling. Teachers at schools benefit greatly because they have time to improve on their pedagogy by learning new and engaging instructional

A problem that burdens classrooms across the nation is a lack of energy and fatigue. Early start times for school cause students to wake-up early, and the large amounts of homework cause them to stay up late. The lack of sleep affects teenage student worst of all because their developing brains need the most sleep possible. Consequently, students’ grades could begin to suffer because they are not retaining information. “I feel exhausted and unable to learn,” says a student when asked how she feels in her first-hour class. Research states that the average school start time is 8:00. To avoid this dilemma, schools should start classes later, have a study period first-hour in lieu of an actual class, or assign less homework so students can get to bed at a reasonable time.

Engaged time, when the student is attentive in class, has a slight impact with student achievement. But the most impactful is the increase in academic learning time, when the students desire for learning is in line with an critical activity (O’Brien). In support of O’Brien, Lucinda Levin, who has attended Daniel Rettig’s seminar about block scheduling, found that the extra time from block scheduling can be double edged sword, “In my study, the teachers in academic courses found this situation detrimental to the learning process, especially for average or below-average students” (Levin). She reasons that some students could not be fully engaged during class, further wasting time, especially since in a 4x4 plan there are fewer number classes for a subject. Although block scheduling may increase the length of a class, it does not directly increase academic learning time specifically, but Levin does not include the possibility that block scheduling can increases it’s opportunity. Especially in STEM classes, where time consuming hands on activities are important to critical

Homework has been at the front of school reform since the early 1900’s. Debates over the benefits of homework include “immediate impact on the retention and understanding of the material it covers” (Cooper, 1989, p.86) and downsides of homework include “satiation, denial of access to leisure time and community activities; parental interference; cheating; and increased differences between high and low achievers” (Cooper, 2006, p.7) have led to a see-saw of support and objection regarding homework. There is support from several studies (Maltese, Tai, Fan, 2012; Cooper, Robinson, Patall, 2006; Falkenberg & Barbetta, 2013) that cite homework as a source of increasing students’ achievement level. None of the

Homework can become more closely monitored to assure that the work being assigned to students is useful and engaging. Parents and students are unhappy with homework assigned as busy work which offers little depth and instead just consumes the student’s time (Melvin). If the High School could keep a closer eye on what teachers are assigning students, this would help to alleviate students who are stuck performing monotonous tasks night after night that do not contribute to their overall educational experience. To elaborate on this, different forms of homework impact certain students differently and good teachers will be able to deliver educational value through different types of work. (Terada). Teachers who always assign only a single type of homework will inevitably be unable to engage their entire class. In order to fully get everyone to become involved and engaged in the work allotted, the school system should make sure that the homework teachers assign to students is constantly

High school students area bombarded with homework for the next school day. It usually takes a student around 2-3 hours to finish homework (Patel). That time does not include extracurricular school activities or other activities such as family time. When students try to fit all of these things in together, homework usually ends up being the one task that takes forever to do! Some students have to pull “all-nighters” in order to complete the assignment (Smith). The student comes to school the next day feeling very tired and that causes him to perform poorly in class. Currently, schools start at 8:10 and end at 3:40, that is including independent reading time, lunch, classes, and times to get to classes.

Schools seem to expect to their ever-diligent and eager students to go home to complete all of their homework and to study for all of their tests. After all, it is the student's fault if they perform poorly because they failed to use their own time to study. The perfect student receives good grades, do all of the assigned homework, and scores well on tests. This does not, and can not, realistically happen. How much time does a student realistically have? How much of that time is being fought over by different priorities? At times, there are assignments due the next day that require a couple hours of the students time when they only have a half hour after getting home late. Or maybe the student is just lazy. The point stands that the student will not always have the time or the will to continue to play the game of school when they are no longer in the building. If the student has no desire, or lost the desire, to educate themselves or practice ideas and processes in their limited after school hours then there is something horribly wrong in how schools go about educating their

It is a well known fact that students of various ages and schools are assigned homework, although the motive for giving said homework may vary depending on the teacher. However, the debate about whether homework is helping or hindering education is at a stalemate. Stated simply, homework is work assigned by teachers that students should complete at home or any other non-school setting. Just how effective is homework in the long run? Is it just adding unnecessary stress to students without truly adding enough positivity to make the homework worth it? Although homework can seem burdensome, it undoubtedly solidifies concepts learned in class and aids in the development of timeless skills such as time management and accountability.